Riley Greene has by no means seen the ball like this earlier than. You by no means know the way somebody will react to their first postseason expertise – gamers have been identified to press or freeze up – however Greene has finished no such factor. He’s chasing pitches exterior the strike zone about as steadily as he did within the common season. In the meantime, he’s locked in when pitchers problem him. He’s swinging at 85% of pitches within the strike zone, up from about 66% in the course of the common season. And when he will get one proper down the center, he’s going for it: He’s taken 13 swings at 15 such pitches, additionally an 85% swing charge, up from 73% earlier than October.
Only one downside: Greene is hitting .133/.278/.200 within the playoffs. He’s strolling at about the identical clip, and his strikeouts are barely down. In the meantime, his energy has utterly disappeared. He has one extra-base hit, a double. He hasn’t barreled up a single ball. His bat pace is down two ticks from the common season, and down practically 2.5 mph from his second-half mark. He’s making extra weak contact and fewer exhausting contact. This stuff don’t fairly make sense collectively. Are we taking a look at a fluke of batted ball luck or a pattern?
Now, let’s be sincere with ourselves. It’s in all probability at the very least partly a fluke of batted ball luck. We’re speaking about 4 video games right here, 18 plate appearances. You’re not presupposed to learn an excessive amount of into samples that small, and if you happen to do, it is best to give attention to probably the most steady indicators you’ll find. On-base share? Slugging? Heck, strikeout charge? We haven’t seen practically sufficient to take these at face worth. However I do suppose one thing’s fallacious, so I believed I’d dig a bit deeper.
I’ll let you know instantly, the bat pace bit I discussed was a purple herring. Bat pace and swing size are correlated to hit path: pulled batted balls come from swings that meet the ball out in entrance of the plate, with usually longer swing lengths and sooner swing speeds. That’s simply physics. Listed below are Greene’s batted balls this postseason:
Wish to register decrease bat pace? Begin going oppo with all the things. I watched all of these swings to get an concept of what’s happening right here. A few of them are simply Greene being a superb hitter. Right here he’s in a 1-2 rely towards Tanner Bibee:
That’s nice work. With two strikes, he each shortened up and waited on his swing for a greater probability at pitch identification. It’s exhausting to show round a 94-mph fastball on the outer third, so he didn’t attempt to; he simply stayed on airplane and “hit the ball the place it was pitched,” to make use of teaching parlance.
This Matthew Boyd sinker then again:
That’s a slower pitch, in a better location, in a friendlier rely. Greene didn’t submit his greatest skilled season by taking pictures balls like that the opposite means; he sprayed them to all fields with authority, notably when he didn’t have his again towards the wall. However, effectively, he additionally hit them the opposite means generally. He simply bought higher outcomes:
I picked that clip to indicate the inherent issue of evaluating hitters based mostly on a small pattern. These two swings are strikingly related. They each got here on 91-mph fastballs that had been simply off of lifeless middle. They each got here in even counts, when Greene might hunt a pitch to hit. His swing towards Boyd makes me suppose he was anticipating one thing delicate after which adjusted to a fastball. I’m unsure I’d have made that alternative towards Boyd, who began lefties with fastballs greater than half the time this 12 months, however I can perceive the pondering. One simply went out, and the opposite wanted ever so barely extra juice.
Whereas I used to be capable of finding different instances that Greene poked a fastball the opposite strategy to nice success, I do suppose there’s one thing right here. Small pattern or no, not sufficient information to stabilize however, it’s simply true that Greene is sending the ball the other means much more steadily within the final 4 video games than he often does.
Possibly it’s associated to the way in which he’s being pitched. Greene has confronted two lefty starters and a few lefty relievers already. A 3rd of the pitches he’s seen have include a platoon drawback, far greater than his profession charge. That places him on the defensive proper from the beginning; like just about each lefty, he hits worse and pulls the ball much less steadily towards same-handed pitching.
It will get a bit weirder from there. There’s a normal pitching rule that any youth coach can let you know: exhausting in and delicate away. It refers to attacking hitters with fastballs inside after which secondary pitches that break free from them, to the skin fringe of the plate and even exterior. It’s exhausting to do this each time in observe, however as a normal rule, most pitchers comply with it. Right here’s the place the fastballs Greene noticed this common season had been positioned:
And listed here are all of the fastballs he’s seen within the playoffs:
To place it one other means, 15% of the fastballs Greene confronted within the common season had been strikes within the inside third of the zone. Within the playoffs, he’s seen 39 fastballs. Precisely a kind of has been on the inside third, and that was a demon cutter from Emmanuel Clase that dotted the inside edge at 101 and broke Greene’s bat. Usually, Greene feasts on these pitches. He doesn’t whiff usually, makes a ton of exhausting contact, and slugs .691 when he places the ball in play.
He’s not getting an opportunity to do this up to now, and I think about that has made for a tough adjustment. To make issues much more complicated, pitchers are venturing inside with secondary pitches at double the speed they did within the common season. Lefties are front-dooring him with sliders, whereas righties are throwing them to his again foot, or at the very least attacking the within edge to maintain him guessing when he leans out on the lookout for fastballs.
It’s means too early to say that that is the way in which to beat Greene. Once more, it’s been 4 video games. Change the batted ball luck simply barely, or let him catch that Boyd sinker only a tiny bit extra flush, and we is perhaps speaking about how he’s adapting to the way in which he’s pitched and punishing pitchers for his or her unconventional strategy. However none of that has occurred, and truthfully, I don’t suppose he’s discovered the best way to deal with it but. He actually has hit with much less authority, and he actually does appear to be getting rotated making an attempt to deal with all these exterior fastballs.
Right here’s the excellent news for Tigers followers: Riley Greene is a famous person and a hitting genius. If he may very well be defeated by a easy tactic like finding fastballs elsewhere, he wouldn’t have popped 24 homers and slugged .479 in cavernous Comerica Park, a subject that’s a depressing 16% beneath common in the case of lefty dwelling runs. For those who present Greene the identical search for per week straight, it’s a reasonably good wager that he’ll regulate to it.
If you watch Greene bat right now, control the place the fastballs are. If the previous few video games are any indication, they’ll largely be up and away. And if they’re, it’s Greene’s job to make the opposition pay, both by punching them the opposite means like he did towards Bibee or by hammering those that leak over the center of the plate. Up to now, he hasn’t been as much as the duty. However it’s solely a matter of time earlier than he figures it out. The one query is whether or not it would occur in time to rescue Detroit’s moribund offense, which has scored fewer than three runs a recreation this October. He’ll have to regulate rapidly – or hope for some extra Tarik Skubal shutouts to provide him extra time to be taught.
